Modern electronic devices utilize processors to carry out various functions that are necessary to or that enhance the electronic device's functionality. Processors can be in the form of circuit boards, wired-in processors, or other fixed or removable elements containing components that carry out computations, data processing, and other functions.
Electronic devices can be designed to operate in hostile environments, meaning environments that can negatively affect the functioning of electronic devices. Hostile environments can include radiation or other conditions that are known to negatively affect the performance of electronic devices. It is thus useful to provide radiation hardening for processors and other elements of electronic devices that are used in hostile environments, to prevent and/or mitigate data errors and computational component failures due to radiation and other conditions.
Three levels of electrical device component radiation tolerance are presently available. The first level is an unprotected component, which can experience both recoverable errors (e.g., bit flips) and destructive errors when utilized in a hostile environment. The second level is commonly referred to as radiation tolerant, and includes electrical device components that are designed such that destructive errors are avoided in hostile environments, but recoverable errors such as bit flips may still occur. The third level is commonly referred to as radiation hardened, and includes electrical device components that experience neither recoverable nor destructive errors when utilized in a hostile environment.
Bit flip errors are a form of single-event upsets in which a state change occurs in memory or in a register, such as from 0 to 1 or vice versa. These are generally not fatal to the device, but can require correction to avoid propagation of errors in computations based thereon. Critical upsets are more serious errors, and generally require a shutdown and restart, or a reset of the computing device affected.
The processing power of radiation-hardened processors tends to be less than state-of-the-art commercially-available non-radiation-hardened processors. The processing power of a radiation-hardened processor can be, for example, one or two generations behind commercially-available non-radiation-hardened processors.
The use of commercial or non-space-rated devices in space applications and other hostile environments is desirable due to the growing performance needs (and size and weight limitations) for emerging space applications and the slow performance of existing space-qualified devices.
To ensure that radiation hardening of commercial components by design and software truly provides error-free data collection and processing, a platform is needed for testing the feasibility and performance of radiation hardening by design and software, error correction and corrective techniques enabling use of commercial processing (non-radiation hardened) devices in hostile environments.